Tuesday, February 22, 2022

Replacing the Sliders on Eximius

Replacing the Cabinet Sliders.


The sliding doors that keep stuff inside the cabinets in the Head, Galley and above the Nav table may have been abused, damaged and some replaced over the years, it's time to bring them all up to a decent standard (mine).

I removed the old sliders, not as easy as it would seem. The old doors were not all the same size height and had to be persuaded to leave the grooves where they have lived for several years if not forever.


Two of the handles were missing, they broke off before we owned Eximius. 
These were from Amazon, pack of 10 for $40, they're actually very nice and the sizes seemed to be just right.







I took the old sliders down to Prospect Plastics, six in all along with one of the new handles.

Prospect Plastics needed a week to finish the new sliders including drilling the handle holes, total cost was $72 plus the $40 for the handles from Amazon.

The Head Cabinet with Sliders installed


The Galley Storage with Sliders installed



The Nav Table shelf sliders installed.
The Electrical pane is partially open in this photo.

It was a quick job really. Took more time to remove the old sliders as they were not cut very accurately and difficult to get them out of the grooves. I had the new plastic sliders made 1/16" shorter, they fit snug but are a lot easier to install. They are also 3/16" thick compared to the 1/8" originals.


Cross that one off the list.

See you on the water :)


Gas Bottles Recertification

 One of our Gas Bottles Leaked when at the refill station.


Eximius has two Propane Tanks, they are the Worthington Aluminum 6lb tanks, I had to change out the empty tank on board over the New Year's Eve Cruise and so had to take it to get refilled. The Propane station in Margate reported that the tank leaked, the guy demonstrated the issue. Needed to get a new valve. The Bottles cost over $200 in a good year, right now they are not available and on back order till June 2022.

We normally take the tanks to Ameri Gas in Fort Lauderdale, but when I asked them on the phone if they could replace the valve and recertify the tank, they informed me that they were only able to refill, all of their techs and office staff were out due to the pandemic, sounds a bit iffy to me.

I found the valve online and ordered one, also watched a YouTube on how to change the valve, it was easy, ok, easy in theory, difficult in practice. But with a bit of sweat I was able to change out the valve. 
The tank was new  in 2006, and apparently it has to be recertified after 12 years and then every 5 years. I had both tanks recertified a couple of years ago, but I'm pretty sure it was a rip off, there were no labels applied to the tanks.


The new Valve came from Nash Fuel via Amazon, it arrived ahead of schedule.

I always wondered what the inside of the valve looked like.

The attachment thread is on both the inside and outside of the valve so it fits our older style fitting on board as well as the newer style fitting on our Gas Grill at home.












The new valve installed, now I just needed to get the tank recertified and filled.

We found a company 'Hogans Gas' in Lake Worth that could do the refill, recertification and in a single trip. It was well worth the drive up there.

It cost $30 to get two tanks recertified and the empty filled, the second one was almost full, so they just recertified it and topped it up with Propane.

The guys at Hogans Gas were very polite, helpful and happy to share tips.

It turns out the Cylinders need to be recertified every 5 years from now on.

I'll put a note in my calendar.





As it turns out, I needn't have taken the trouble to change out the valve, Hogans Gas would have done it with a lot less sweat on my part.


So, we're all gassed up for the St. Pats Day Cruise. Hope to see you on the water.













Wednesday, February 9, 2022

Lost Engine Key

 

We lost our Engine Key

We had just done some testing of the boat's Battery Charging System as it was not charging the house batteries. Part of that test was to see if the Batteries were being charged by the engine Alternator.
I opened the engine raw water valve and Peggy went into the cockpit with the key to start the engine.

Oh! When we got to the boat today, I replaced all of the rusty hatch padlocks with Combination locks and I threw the old locks and their common key in the garbage, just before the garbage collection trucks arrived.

When Peggy tried to insert the key into the engine control panel it would not turn! It was the wrong key.
Did I toss out the wrong key? 

Of course, we have a spare, of course it's on the boat, of course.

Nope! What I thought were spare engine Ignition keys were not (I know, it's a diesel, there's no Ignition, but the key controls the Engine control panel start button, Glow Plug Button, Blower Button and the Panel Lights.)

We dug into all of the obvious places, Nav Table, Key hooks, pant's pockets, I even went out to the car to see if we had put a spare there. During the search for the missing key, I found 3 spares, but they were not the engine control panel key! Grrrr.

Peggy was trying every key we found even those that were obviously not the right key. But one did fit and it did turn and it did allow us to start the engine.

It was at that point that Peggy reminded me. The last time we took the boat out, the engine overheated because I didn't open the Raw Water valve. After that fiasco, I was reminded that some skippers put the Engine Control key on the Raw Water Thru hull valve - to act as a reminder to open the valve before trying to start the engine. I had removed the key from the boat's general key set and put it on a seperate floating key fob so that I could hang it on the Valve.

DUH! We found the key exactly where it was supposed to be, exactly where I was supposed to look.

Today I went to Lowes and had 3 spare engine control panel keys made, we have a second for on the boat, another on my car key ring and a 4th on Peggy's key ring.

I'm guessing we'll remember where the key is next time we want to start the engine.

Oh! The Battery charger - Failed :(  The Zantrax Freedom 20 Inverter Charger is least 18 years old and not worth fixing. I'll post another article about that.

Meanwhile, we can start the engine and charge the batteries because we know where the key is located. 

See you on the water (if we can find it ;)

Paul